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Friday, February 21, 2014

Mars, Music & MLP

Image Credit:

NASA/JPL-Caltech

IN REVERSE: A shadow-selfie, here's a photo taken by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity. The pic was taken with the left-eye camera of MSL's stereo Navigation Camera (NavCam).

Recently, project managers decided to have the one-ton rover drive in reverse, in hopes of reducing excessive wear on its six metal wheels. which have been taking a beating over the last few months. Curiosity completed its first long backward drive on Feb. 18.

Curiosity is slowly making its way to the base of 3.4 mile high Mount Sharp. It should reach there by June. Right now, it's in the Moonlight Valley region of the Red Planet.

MUSIC MAKERS: We listened to a couple of lectures today for our Beatles' music class. The kids are really enjoying it. It's easy for them to understand, they're rather familiar with The Beatles catalog, so they know most of the music being referenced, and the subject matter is a lot easier than physics. :)

As usual, Annabelle has been employing her cartoon-note-taking approach.

EARLY RISERS: While most people sleep in on Saturdays, that's the day of the week CJ and Annabelle get up earliest. Their favorite show, "My Little Pony Friendship is Magic" is on at 7 a.m., so they're up around 6:45.

Annabelle churns out several ponies a week - and sometimes several a day - in crayon, chalk, and on computer. Here's one she made in MS Paint recently. Its name is Partly Cloudy.